Looking Back
by Karis Artemisia Judith
Summary: Three years ago, when Anna told Kristoff that she wouldn't be allowed to marry him, he kissed her goodbye while she slept and disappeared...but many things can happen in three years. Kristoff didn't intend to see Anna when he returned to the city, but she's determined to see him.


**Notes:** This is a continuation of jenniferjuni-per's 'Don't Look Back', and several writers have contributed additional stories that follow this one. You can find them all (and some lovely artwork) by following the link in my profile!

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Anna lingered in the square, her lighthearted mood slipping away like mist. Three years—it had been three years since she'd woken up alone, the bed cold beside her. Surely after three years she should have stopped seeing him everywhere, but Kristoff still haunted her steps. She expected him every night in her dreams, but it was too much for her heart to still jump every time she saw hair of the certain shade of golden yellow, or shoulders that were especially broad. It was too much for her to always be listening for a certain voice. _Stop looking for him, Anna_, she thought fiercely, pinching at the inside of her elbow to distract herself. _Stop looking. He isn't coming back for you this time._

_He isn't coming back._

She glanced at the castle, knowing she was expected back for lunch soon…but she turned her back on it. There was still time. She needed to walk. She needed to be in open places, places that didn't wrap her up in formalities and traditions like chains, keeping her from the things she wanted. Anna rubbed at her temple as she turned toward the quieter, unoccupied streets where she wouldn't meet many people, knowing she was being unfair. Elsa was trying, but it took time to change laws, time to get people used to new ideas. And Elsa had stood by her during the scandal and dug up old laws and silenced the cruel whispers, at least the ones in the castle. It had worked, hadn't it? It had just…been a little late.

The bells in the church spire began to peal, and Anna groaned, turned to run toward the castle—_no, walk quickly, don't run, and smile at people_—but as she came around the corner she thumped into a warm, furry body.

"Sorry!" she said quickly, "sorry—" She started to circle around, then she stopped, as if her feet were nailed to the ground. The reindeer looked back at her, big round eyes blinking slowly. "Sven," she whispered. He looked from side to side, as if to say 'who, me?' but Anna caught hold of his harness, his so very familiar harness, the harness that she had watched being cleaned and repaired countless times by careful, meticulous fingers. "_Sven_." She put a shaking hand on his muzzle, making him look at her. "Sven, where is he? He's here, he has to be here—" She turned, still gripping Sven's harness, her eyes searching the street frantically, her heart pounding. "Where is he?"

The reindeer nudged her in the back gently, making her look back—and there he was, stooping to avoid hitting his head on the low doorway as he stepped from one of the tiny shops into the street, adjusting the strap of his bag on his shoulder. It felt like a lifetime before he looked up, but when he did Anna felt her knees go weak, her weight sagging against Sven's shoulder.

He looked in many ways so much the same, still so tall, so broad, his hair still shaggy around his face. And yet he looked different, rougher and more rugged, the expression in his eyes darker. The mouth she remembered with such heart-pounding clarity was a hard line.

"Kristoff," she whispered.

She pushed away from Sven, taking a stumbling step forward, but the grimness of his mouth made her stop short of flinging herself into his arms. Instead she stood in front of him, her weight balanced awkwardly on the balls of her feet as her whole body leaned forward, her left hand anxiously squeezing her right.

"Kristoff?"

She couldn't be here.

She couldn't be here, like this, saying his name like that, not when he'd used up so much of his strength already to turn away from just a glimpse of her.

Kristoff shrugged awkwardly, shifting his feet, tearing his eyes away from her even though he wanted to stare at her, to drink in every detail of her now that she was close to him. She was so close that he could smell her sweetness and it made his heart burn in his chest, memories of her warm in his arms flooding him. He clenched his fists against them.

"Princess."

He tried to ignore her faint gasp, the flinch that he sensed more than saw as he stepped past her, but he couldn't ignore the hand clenched in his shirt.

"Are you okay?"

"Fine," he said shortly. "Of course I'm fine."

"Good, I—good." Suddenly she flung her arms around him from behind, and he stiffened as he felt her soft body press against his back. "I'm glad you're alive. I'm so glad. I thought—I thought I would know, if something had happened to you, but then you were gone for so long and we couldn't find any trace of you, and I got so scared—"

"I'm fine." His voice was rough but he couldn't help that—he had to get out of the city before he picked her up and carried her to somewhere more private. _She's not yours. _He pulled away from her grip. "I need to go."

"Go? Do you have to go?"

"Yes."

"No, stay!" Anna got in between him and Sven, her hands lifted pleadingly. "Please stay?"

"I can't."

"Yes, you can! Kristoff—"

He growled under his breath—he needed her to stop saying his _name_ like that—and grabbed her by the waist, meaning to simply pick her up and move her out of his way, but even as he lifted her his fingers were savoring the familiar curve of her hip and he had to fight the urge to pull her against him.

Her hands came up to grip his arms tightly before her could let her go, almost dropping her in his haste to get away from her smell and the pleading blue eyes that she was lifting to his face. "Kristoff, please—just stay for a little while? I—there's the twins. You should meet them, Kristoff."

He pulled away so hard that she stumbled.

"_No_."

"Kristoff—"

"_Go away_, Anna." He turned to Sven, preparing to pull himself onto the reindeer's back and flee the city without even stopping to pick up his sleigh from the shed where he'd left it. "I'm not staying."

"Please, I just—I—please. You don't have to stay, if you don't want—just, please."

He could hear the tears in her voice and his hand clenched on Sven's harness, making the reindeer grunt. His friend twisted his neck to look at him, expressive eyes ever so slightly accusing. _You're making her cry_, he seemed to say. _You ran off so that you wouldn't have to face her crying and here you are. You deserve this_.

"I just want you to see them." Her voice was so soft, so small. It was like a knife.

His shoulder sagged, his head bowing, and he shut his eyes tightly for a moment. "I saw," he said finally. The harshness had left his voice, leaving it quiet, but he didn't look at her. "I saw them, in the square. They're—" Kristoff stopped, clearing his throat roughly, his fingers rubbing up and down one strap of the harness blindly. "They're beautiful, Anna. I always…I always knew your children would be beautiful." She reached for his arm but he jerked away, dodging to the other side of the reindeer and fiddling with buckles, his shoulders rising again. "And him?" he asked, as if the question was being dragged out of him.

Anna blinked. "Him who?"

"_Him_, your—your husband. What's he like?" He yanked on the harness so hard that Sven snorted and moved away from him irritably. "Sorry, buddy," Kristoff muttered, patting the reindeer apologetically. He glanced over at Anna, then away hastily. "Is he…is he good to you, Anna?" he asked finally.

Anna stared at his averted face, at the stiff lines of his neck. For once in her life she felt as though all the possible words were withered in her throat. Her heart felt squeezed in her chest. The silence drew out for so long that he finally looked back at her, his eyes dark and guarded, but his mouth had softened ever so slightly and the sight of it gave her enough courage to reach out for him again. At least he didn't yank away from her hand on his arm.

"Kristoff…I don't…I haven't…I don't have a husband. Is that why you left? Because you thought I'd—"

"What do you mean? You had to marry—you—" She saw his eyes go to her hair, twisted up the way married women wore it, and then to her hand, where a thin band of gold circled her finger.

"I'm not married," she said quickly.

"But you—those children—" He was staring fixedly at her hand and her fingers tightened on his sleeve. She could feel herself blushing as she fumbled to explain.

"I mean, people think—we told everyone that—" Anna took a deep breath. "You remember how the trolls tried to marry us, when you first took me see them?" He nodded jerkily and she took another breath before she went on. "After you left…and we couldn't find you…and…Elsa convinced everyone that you and I got married back then, and she dug in her heels until the council acknowledged it as legal, and…."

"But why would you—" He stopped. She could see his thoughts catching up, could see the moment when he finally let himself understand instead of shutting her out completely. He sagged a little, and Sven crowded closer to support him. "But…" he whispered. "Anna, then—those children—" His wide eyes searched her face and she smiled up at him, feeling her lips trembling.

"They're yours," she said, her hand lifting to press against his chest. "Yours." She shrugged a little, blushing inexplicably. "They're…ours." Anna waited for him to say something—to say anything—but he just kept staring at her blankly. She bit her lip anxiously, and tugged gently on his arm. "Come and see them," she said pleadingly. "You don't have to stay, if you don't want, but just…just come. Please?"

Sven had to nudge him hard before he moved, staggering forward, but when Anna caught his hand and pulled he followed her. He was still silent as she towed him after her to the castle, where luncheon was surely already over, which meant that the twins would be found in the garden under the watchful eye of their nurse. She heard their laughter before she saw them—Kristoff heard it to, his head jerking up and the muscles of his arm stiffening beneath her hand as his fist clenched. He closed his eyes too late to hide the naked longing, and Anna anxiously tugged him forward, but as soon as they were around the corner of the manicured shrubbery Kristoff's arm pulled from her grip as he dropped heavily to his knees.

"Kristoff—"

He shook his head, lifting one hand to his eyes, but it didn't matter—the little boy had seen his mother and was toddling over the grass to them as fast as his chubby legs could go.

"Mama!" Anna caught him as he plunged at her, but no sooner had she lifted him than he was wiggling to get down again and fling himself fearlessly against the stranger. "What's your _name_?" he demanded, with all the imperiousness of almost three years of age.

Kristoff tried to wipe surreptitiously at his face as he lowered his hand, looking down into curious brown eyes that were eerily familiar.

"Kristoff," he said hoarsely. "It's Kristoff."

The brown eyes in that small, round face went wide. "But _I'm_ Kristoff!" He looked accusingly up at his mother. "Mama! _I'm_ Kristoff!"

"I know you are, but he's _also_ Kristoff," she said, a grin breaking through her anxious expression. "Remember, I told you stories about Big Kristoff?"

"Big Kristoff climbs mountains," the little boy said. Anna caught the startled look of the big Kristoff in question and she shrugged sheepishly, blushing.

"That's right. This is _Big_ Kristoff."

"Oh."

Kristoff—_Big_ Kristoff, apparently—had to close his eyes again. There was a burning pain in his chest. He felt a helplessly longing to gather his son (his _son_) up in his arms, but it was as though weights held him down. He couldn't, he was a stranger to his own son, a bed time story. But little Kristoff solved the dilemma for him by clambering over his bent knees and seizing him around the neck.

"Big Kristoff, don't _cry_!" For a moment he pressed the small body close, but then his son spotted Sven over his shoulder and began squirming out of his grip. "Mama! Mama! He has a _reindeer!_ He _is_ Big Kristoff! It's like the song!"

Sven dropped down onto his belly in time for the boy to crash into his shoulder, little voiced raised in a warbling, lisping version of a song that Kristoff remembered, a tune that had been easy to hum, that he'd had a silly habit of putting lyrics too in idle moments, and the words that little Kristoff was singing were the ones that he would always remember. He'd improvised them on a snowy night in July, right before fate had dropped Anna (and a bag of supplies) into his lap. He looked up at her. She was fidgeting, blushing, as if she had no idea what to do with herself.

"How does he know-?"

"I taught it to them," she said quietly. "It's…it's their bedtime song. I sing it when they're going to sleep. I wanted…" She spread her hands helplessly, then clasped them again. "I wanted them to have something that came from you."

He looked over his shoulder, to where his son was making a determined effort to climb Sven like a mountain, but a soft touch on his knee made him look back. The little girl—_his daughter_—apparently felt that her brother had blazed a trail. She had one hand clenched in Anna's skirt, but her other was laid hesitantly on Kristoff's leg. She gazed up at him, blue eyes thoughtful.

"Hello," he said quietly. She didn't answer.

Anna finally knelt down in the grass, after gently loosening the girl's grip on her skirt and transferring it to her hand. "She doesn't talk very much, yet," she said, a little defiantly. "I'm sure she knows _how_, she just never has to—Kristoff is always talking _for_ her."

"She's beautiful," he whispered. He could have looked at her for hours, entranced by the soft roundness of her cheeks, the faint sprinkling of freckles that already graced her tiny nose, the halo of red-gold curls around her head, her beautiful eyes. Slowly, carefully, he held out a hand to her, and after studying it carefully she curled her chubby fingers around one of his. "What's her name?"

"Beata. It—it means 'blessed'." At the sound of her name the little girl looked up at her mother, then her eyes swung back to Kristoff as he repeated it.

"_Beata_."

She let go of Anna completely in order to stretch both of her arms out to him. "Up," she said, her little voice soft but clear. He picked her up carefully, expecting her to let him hold her for just a moment before getting down, as her brother had, but instead she laid her head against his shoulder, curling her little body up against his chest as if she would be content to stay there forever. Kristoff cradled her to him. He bowed his head, kissed the downy hair almost reverently.

He felt Anna's hand brush lightly over his hair, his shoulder. "Kristoff?"

"Why did you…" He had to stop and swallow. "Their names—why?"

"Because…well, Kristoff, after you, because I wanted them to have as much of you as I could give them. And Beata…because I was blessed. You were gone, but I had part of you with me. Not," she added, wrinkling up her nose, "not that there weren't a lot of moments when I didn't _feel_ blessed. Especially when I was sick all the time. And when I couldn't wear shoes. And when they were, y'know, being born. But when I got to hold them…I just…" She reached out to stroke a hand over Beata's head, nestled confidingly against Kristoff's shirt. "I felt like you were with me again, somehow. I missed you so much." Her voice broke at the end, and she turned her head away.

Still holding his daughter in the curve of one arm, Kristoff reached out to Anna with the other, his fingers curving hesitantly over her damp cheek. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm so sorry, Anna, I—there was never a moment when I didn't miss you. I shouldn't have left you. I shouldn't have _abandoned_ you. Anna—"

"You're here now." She put her hand over his, pressing he cheek into his palm. "You're here. Will you…will you stay?"

"Will you still have me?" he asked.

For answer Anna pressed herself against his side, burying her face in the shoulder unclaimed by Beata. He curled his arm around her, holding her close against his chest beside their daughter, unable to stop the prickling of tears in his eyes, as his daughter made a warm softness over his heart and Anna's small, strong body curved close to his. There were no more questions to ask—he was never leaving them again.

Little Kristoff, bored with Sven when he realized that he couldn't climb on the reindeer's back without help, toddled back to fling himself on the ground in front of the adults who were so strangely ignoring him.

"Mama," he announced, flopping in the grass, "I am _bored_. We need to _play_."


End file.
